Are D&D Atheists Idiots?
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- Опубліковано 8 вер 2024
- In a world with apparent gods, where divine magic is a category of reality, can it be reasonable to be an atheist?
#dnd #worldbuilding #ttrpg #atheism #philosophy
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I argue a dnd atheist doesn't deny the existence of "gods" they just don't accept them as a divine power, basically just seeing them as very powerful monsters, but not some "divine being"
More anti-theist than atheist, I suppose.
I love the idea from the Discworld stories. Of course the gods exist, but that's no reason to go around believing in them. It just encourages their bad behavior.
That sounds like agnosticism with extra malice
Aren’t they manifest upon belief in them ?
@@mcpurplemuffin3913 Yep. To the point that the most extreme atheist is almost as good as a true believer. It takes a lot of effort to actively not believe in something you can interact with
@@jarrickhillery8664 Where's the malice?
The most successful Discworld Atheist is Dorfl the Golem. The reason is a simple immunity to lightning bolts, and a calm "That's not a very convincing argument." The Gods of the Disc are petty, vindictive, and like to use Atheists for target practice. In Dorfl they found a true unbeliever they just couldn't smite into oblivion.
I believe the elevator pitch for Planescape was "philosophers with clubs." Truly, an incredibly fascinating work.
Wait... "philosophers with social groups" or "philosophers with cudgels"?
Probably both.
Considering the careers some of the ancient and classical Greek and Chinese philosophers had before they became philosophers, and the behavior of some even after becoming philosophers?
Quite a few would have no issue physically beating someone if the verbal and mental beat down wasn't accepted. Some of them would consider that a failure, but if you attempted physical violence against them to refute one of their points, they had no issue lethally defending them selves. Then their was the one that publicly committed suicide just to prove a point rather than submit to the will of the government of Athens.
@@jlokisonCould you please provide more examples besides Socrates? I do not mean to refute you, but I'm quite curious about this topic, and I would love to know more.
"I don't hold with paddlin' with the occult," said Granny firmly. "Once you start paddlin' with the occult you start believing in spirits, and when you start believing in spirits you start believing in demons, and then before you know where you are you're believing in gods. And then you're in trouble."
"But all them things exist," said Nanny Ogg.
"That's no call to go around believing in them. It only encourages 'em."
- Terry Pratchetts Lords and Ladies.
Fantastic quote. I am stealing that
My favorite take on D&D atheists is that they believe a true God would be all powerful, and the fact that there are multiple gods with different portfolios means that they aren’t truly Gods, but instead powerful extra planer beings harvesting the souls of the prime material realm for their own purposes, and are therefore invaders that should not only not be worshipped but actively fought against.
sounds very similar to the daedra in the Elder Scrolls mythos
"don't you believe in the powers of the gods?"
"a Druid passed by my farm one day & made my fields produce much more than any Cleric ever did."
Druids are specialty priests who worship nature deities.
@@Thagomizer D&D Druids are closer to IRL shamans, while IRL Druids were D&D Nature Clerics.
@@jgr7487 Bah, I prefer older editions.
@@jgr7487 But Shamans are also priests tho.
@@gokbay3057 shamans can connect the faithful with spirits & their ancestors besides gods. You could say that shintoist priests do the same, but the difference is that Wildshape is closer to powers credited to shamans than to priests.
And, yes, atheist Japanese do go to certain shrines to ask for a good school exam & such things.
I remember a post on tumblr where someone noted that atheists in DND wouldn't believe that gods don't exist, instead that they aren't as big of a deal as people say.
Archfey are very powerful creatures who basically live forever and can influence the material plane, whose to say the 'gods' aren't similar?
Since divine magic is treated the same way as arcane most of the time, it could be manipulating the weave as well, instead of some divine force.
Actually I hadn't considered this one but yes that would be another example that works in D&D.
the idea that the gods are powerful but the real world has super powerful creatures too, we are talking about worlds where red dragons exist which can cast spells and talk.
I can see how someone could come to the notion that "they are powerful beings but we already have them here. how are they that much different"
In Forgotten Realms you run into issues with the Weave being the goddess Mystra - Ed Greenwood really likes his Mystra for whatever reason...
@@MeneltirFalmaro Yeah well atheists could argue that Mystra just wrapped herself up in the weave enough that killing her would bring down the ship
Personally I do have a lot of creatures in my world that are not fond of gods. Primordials and other elementals, Aberrations, some fiends, some fey... But to call them "atheists" is misleading. They are "ANTItheists". Beings that are opposing gods in one way or another. Mortals imho are way more likely to be agnostics - to doubt that what is called "god" actually is the ultimate creator instead of some imposter. Becuase if some villagers in the middle of nowhere can be fools enough to worship local archfey as a diety, or be idiotic enough to call an archfiend a god - then what certainty could the mortals have that "gods" aren't just scammers of a higher power level?
I actually already exploit it in my world, by having one monoteistic religion that believes in the LITERAL SUN, saying that all other gods are simply "spirits our creator tasked with creating our world in his image, because he himself was too hot to get close to the world, else he burned it all". Nice way to not only demote other dieties to a subservient position, but also blame all the evils and woes of the world on those subservient "gods" doing a borked job making the creator's vision a reality! :V
That said, some of what you speak of in this video are new and quite inspiring things for me. I shall use it well~
That's more or less gnosticism where the Demiurge who created the world is an idiotic subordinate of the true god, and is keeping us trapped in reality instead of allowing us to become entirely spiritual.
And the funny thing is that the demiurge is served by the archons. Like all lawful good gods in D&D.
This is relevant to a story I'm writing in a DnD-inspired world. My story focuses around a goddess who loses her divinity and has to live among mortals, and the first person she meets, while not exactly an atheist, is someone who holds a grudge against the gods, and for good reason. He's someone who refuses to worship or honor or venerate them in any way for two reasons: 1) His wife was killed by religious zealots, and 2) he cried out to the gods for help in that moment, and none came.
His views would probably be closest to the Athar. While he doesn't deny their divinity, he (correctly, IMO) sees divinity as more a level of magical power than something which, by its nature, demands reverence. To him, the gods are more like the aristocracy - incredibly powerful and influential, able to change the lives of ordinary people in extraordinary ways, but not fundamentally different from anyone else. One might defer to a god out of self-interest, maybe even suck up to them in order to receive favors, but that doesn't make the god somehow better or more worthy. They don't wield their power because they did something to deserve it. It's merely an accident of birth, and the gods are as capable of being evil, neglectful, or corrupt as anyone else. Ultimately, the only difference between a god and a wizard-king is that the god wields more power and doesn't age.
Made a similar character once, never did get use them
Sounds very similar to Gorr the god butcher from marvel comics. (His origin at least)
(this comment is 2 months old, so crossing fingers is even still being paid attention to, but there's some details can probably help with regarding your story) As an owner of a physical copy of "Deities and Demigods", there's some rules for 3.5e D&D divinity that you can make use of. Divine beings have an actual rank starting at 0, with rank 0 being a "demigod". So that's where your former-god would probably be. They actually need permission from certain rank 20+ entities (like Ao) to rank up so there is maybe precedent for them actively knocking someone down ranks, as well.
Also, what sets them apart from just someone powerful is that gods actually REQUIRE belief in them to exist/gain ranks. (this stems from 3.5e explaining how the planes are sort of agglomerations of concepts floating around the Astral plane, with it being more a plane of dreams/thoughts than "fantasy version of space". Meaning, the gods that naturally exist instead of just an ascended mortal are actually a further product of those coalesced concepts like "light", "victory", "war", and so on.)
that's actually called misotheism, the hatred or dislike of God or gods.
@@dudeboydudeboy-zj8kd Correct. I was one myself once.
I once played a cleric who believed that death was the only true God because all other so called gods are subjects to death. I have a few other concepts for a character who believes that the gods are just exceptionally powerful weave manipulators. Someone who believes that divine spellcasters are just like arcane spellcasters, they just have a different way of manipulating the weave.
Sounds like The House of Black and White and its Faceless Men, and the associated Death Cult, in Braavos from A Song of Ice And Fire/Game of Thrones/House of The Dragon.
@@Vlad_Tepes_III Her belief system was summed up very early as follows. "There is only one true god. His name is Death. And only fools and the desperate speak it."
So yeah, there may have been some inspiration from the Many-Faced God. And by some, I mean a LOT.
> a character who believes that the gods are just exceptionally powerful weave manipulators
How is this not a god? This is certainly the gods of Tunnels And Trolls, a game not so popular, now, as in the early 1970s.
@@davidweihe6052 It's the differance between the gods being something so far apart from mortals that the gulf could never be bridged and the gods just being level 25 wizards/clerics/whatever. In other words, something that mortals could become.
In my setting, some clerics suspect that mages secretly worship forgotten deities, who grant them exclusive spells. Conversely, some mages reckon that clerics are just con-artist mages, and to prove this, experiment in replicating clerical spells, which always leaves them frustrated.
I think currently our biggest problem with TTRPGs Pantheon is that the Western world has been a Monotheism for so long, we no longer understand how things work under a Pantheon.
I think it's important to note that being part of a religion is different in D&D than it is in real life. Just like how Atheism in real life is the denial of all other religions/deities, most modern religions also deny other religions/deities. Christians don't generally accept the existence of the Greek Gods at all, for example. The most accepting of the existence of other religions I've seen is generally a belief that the other religions believe in the same entity or entities and they're just presented differently (which could maybe happen in D&D, but would sound more like a conspiracy theory than anything else, especially since gods can and do interact with each other). In D&D though, even if you worship one god it would be absurd to not believe in the existence of others in the same way it would be if you didn't believe in gods existing at all.
I think the reason for all this comes down to the fact that in real life people believe in their religion and not others, but in D&D they may believe in most or all deities that are well known, but only (or primarily) worship one deity or possibly one pantheon. Because this difference is a thing, and we don't say that worshiping just one god is idiotic in D&D because the existence of others is obvious, I think the most fair and accurate base translation of Atheism to D&D isn't a person that refuses to believe in the existence of gods, but a person that is aware that they exist as entities, but refuses to worship any or acknowledge them as miraculous. The assumption that Atheism would be the same as it is in real life is where this all started, but it just doesn't make sense because religion as a whole is very different from real life.
I sort of view it like this. If we can demonstrate gods exist in a dnd world then atheism isn't a thing. On the other hand you can definitely still be in opposition to those deities. It's totally reasonable to stop and ask "wait, who died and made you monarch of [insert domain here]." Do we actually want to trust powerful entities just because they say they are a god?
Obviously the correct answer depends on how your world works but I think it's a very interesting perspective
@solsystem1342 Depends on your definition of atheism. I disagree with the idea that atheism is the denial of gods. Its the lack of belief. Even in a DND world if you know these extremely powerful beings exist. Why should you believe they are some divine thing and not just something that you currently don't understand like a lich an archfey or some other incredibly powerful creature? A DND atheist so far as I see won't deny gods existence they just don't believe they are that special just another step up on the ladder of powerful guys out there.
@@TrixyTrixter Lack of belief is the definition.
Atheists in dnd are totally possible. In a fictional world where gods exist, having knowledge of those gods without belief would be fine.
I.E I don't believe in cats, I know they exist and I don't worship them.
My current character believes in the gods (because he's seen one), but hates the gods and doesn't worship them because he sees them as illegitimate authoritarian rulers who acquire their authority through force not consent.
Your character would be an iconoclast, someone that knows gods exist but doesn’t worship any of them.
@@w花b
Whatever.
I also have a D&D atheist who's basically a conspiracy theorist who thinks the clerics are just secret wizards-and bad ones at that. One cleric has been healing his wife's headaches for 13 years yet she still has them.
I probably don’t run pure dnd worlds. But when I DM, I like to keep the existence and true nature of the gods a mystery. I like this because different characters having different beliefs about the gods is an awesome source of conflict to explore. So in the worlds I run, being an atheist is a reasonable interpretation of the world, but it might get you killed by an angry mob accusing you of heresy.
The problem with this idea of gods being proven true because divine magic exists.
Is that real magic already exists in the D&D world.
Anything that can be attributed to a god or to divine magic, can just be attributed to that being normal magic
How does a wizard learn their magic?
They go to a place and are taught their magic by people who have already mastered it.
How does a Cleric learn thier magic?
They go to a place and are taught their magic by people who have already mastered it.
Not to mention the existence of Sorcerers and Artificers
My view exactly! What's the difference between a wizard saying "Hokus Pokus" and a cleric saying "Oh my lord a pray to thee"
This is actually something I thought worked well with Dragon Age. Even with magic and the Fade etc: There's a reasonable amount of evidence that 'The Maker' exists but likewise it can entirely be argued against.
Note that most versions of most games that distinguish divine from arcane magic allow you to venerate a principle rather than a being. So that doesn't necessarily follow.
@@thekaxmax That is what I'm saying but made needlessly complicated.
You don't need to explain the source of magic with a principle(aka you are talking about paladins)
Because regular magic existing would cast a divine source for magic into doubt regardless
@@Lordgrayson If you use trh game as written it makes a pretty hard distinction between arcane and divine. Also as written you can use principles and alignments instead of gods, so it's possible to have an atheist divine caster without adding any complexity at all.
I don't see this: "regular magic existing would cast a divine source for magic into doubt regardless" argument at all. Arcane magic doesn't have anything to do with the source of divine power.
The Athar's stance makes sense, when you consider the fact that after reaching a certain threshold of power, even non-deities can bestow divine spells to those who worship them. So if you don't need to be a true god in order to empower your priests and followers, then how can you definitively prove that the ones who hold the position of a true god are what they claim to be?
specially when there are over-gods that don't need worship
I could definitely see a villager who’s seen plenty of adventures go through his town using magic to buff their team mates and reshape the world and just believes gods are more powerful people like that
That guy comes in and says "I studied really hard" and shoots fire out of his fingertips. This guy comes in and says "I prayed really hard" and shoots fire out of his fingertips. I say magic is magic and now my house is on fire, so quit arguing about where it comes from and grab a damn bucket.
As a DM, I try to figure out why someone would choose one religion over another. In a small community, it would seem that almost everyone would follow the same "religion" because of upbringing and a sense of community. As towns get larger, different religions and temples present choice. Why would someone be more comfortable with one church or another. What concepts are important to draw followers. What effect do personalities have on those choices. Imaginary churches, gods, and religions give us the opportunity to explore the best aspects of religion and the worst.
Lets prevent D&D characters from reading and writing. No farmer or villager could ever read according to oppressively confused DMs worldwide.
Which I always thought was strange, because literacy in Medieval times was measured by the ability to read and understand Latin, not their first language.
@@bullethail3875Is that so? That's interesting. Wouldn't that mean it's likely they COULD read and write, but because it wasn't in Latin that they were incorrectly labeled as unable to?
@@darklordmathias9405there's evidence of a medieval peasant sending a written message for his wife, asking for a clean pair of trousers. Shadiversity has a video on it.
@@darklordmathias9405A man could usually read his native language, but literacy really skyrocketed after the Protestants started gaining steam.
Which goes against RAW and history.
I've seen here and there worlds where there were people who just viewed the gods as powerful mortals who ascended in some fashion, so they dismissed the idea of worshipping them. They didn't deny their existence, just their worthiness of worship.
I guess the GM could run the campaign like the movie Eric the Viking starring Tim Robbins. There's a couple scenes that demonstrate that their personal beliefs actually make them experience completely different things.
The Athar are the engine behind psionics, which is anti-divine and anti-magic.
I really like this take about actual atheist types in DnD as appose to those who believe in the gods but are disaffected by them
That question is why, in my homebrew scenario, I made sure to make it very easy for the average person to believe there are no gods.
The party knows this is not true, as they have interacted with divine manifestations multiple times. However, their missions are classified and for most people religion works similarly to how it works in reality. Clerics do in fact perform their miracles through faith alone, though there's little evidence that they're any different from any other mage, so it's up for the viewer to interpret what they're seeing.
The gods themselves are absent from the mortal plane, having escaped this world and isolated themselves into their distant lands, rarely if ever even becoming aware of what's happening with the mortals. The truth about divine magic is that it is completely involuntary from the god's side, as his mere existence emanates power that faith can channel, called essence. The only divine beings still interacting with the mortal world are the Demigods, children of the deities that most people don't even know exist, and Superior Beings, the Demigods' children that are usually treated as mere saints or powerful people.
Among the three Demigods, one is up there with his creators watching over humanity and counseling the other minor divinities, one was defeated and his massive body is sleeping below the ocean while his soul is scattered as a form of psionic power among multiple people in the land (most of which have joined the party at one instance or another), while the third one has been locked inside a mortal woman's body with limited power and has been manipulated by a powerful illusionist to become the campaign's main antagonist. The Superior Beings are what you'd expect from Warlock patrons, celestials and all that. One assumes the form of a gold dragon that built and ruled the land as the "Golden King," another is a saint that protects one of the world's last oasis with intense prayer and druidic power, there's one that's incarnated into one of the main villains and the last of them is this world's version of the Raven Queen (look, the Warlock wanted her to be his patron, so I put her there in a way that fit).
While all of this happens in the background, from the humanoids' point of view it's hard to even know what a "demigod" is, they don't know all that info, so a lot of them blindly believe what the church says while some are openly against faith due to the lack of evidence. The northern society is a theocratical dictatorship, so you can't really announce yourself as an atheist there, but in the southern mage empire, while they have their own gods, a lot of people are radically opposed to religion due to the war against the northern templars, with some of them just refusing gods in order to advance science and intellectualism.
In summary (TL;DR), while the objective answer to "are gods real" is yes in my world, there are very compelling reasons why one would refuse to believe in them, and even more arguments to be made against worshipping them, as they're dismissive of mankind at best and an actual threat to everyone at worst.
My general premise, as an atheist who sometimes plays D&D characters like this, is that of “if you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him”. Basically in any world where you can learn magic from reading a book, or just having a innate aptitude for it, and where magic is a natural force that can be harnessed (see wild magic), it is entirely too easy for anyone half decent at magic to claim divinity. Therefore, assume anyone claiming divinity is a liar. And, given the sheer number of evil people/deities in the world, probably trying to take advantage of you. It is therefore in your best interest to refuse to worship any deity, or engage in any bargaining with them. Because the people who do? Yeah, there what we call “cultists”, and they are always, always on the raw end of whatever deal some “divinity” offered them. Look of course they might try to smite you, but that doesn’t mean they are divine, in fact it shows they aren’t or that even if they are they aren’t worth worshipping in the first place.
I’m not sure if this is strictly speaking atheist, but it’s I think a very natural response to a world where the “gods” are usually trying to use you as pawns for their own plans, and there are well known examples of cults of evil causing havoc. In such cases, a half hearted polytheism would be the norm, and anyone who is a little too into religion is either a rube, or a menace, possibly both.
I am an atheist myself. And have played d&d since the late 90's. And have always loved playing religious characters. My long time friend and fellow player and atheist. Hates playing religious characters. And is often a critic of religion, even in worlds where the gods are real.
I’ve always seen it as like an extreme version of what the dwarves in elder scrolls believe mixed with how the Aboleths think both seem to believe gods exist but don’t care as there nothing more than just more powerful versions of your standard magic user. One could believe there are no “gods” merely the strong who claim divinity. They may not see any difference between a warlock and a cleric.
No time to watch the video but I'll reply on the premise
I think you could easily be an atheist in D&D. But instead of saying gods don't exist, you think the gods aren't really gods.
You can just think of the gods as powerful creatures and nothing more. The fact that gods exist and are proven to interact with the world makes it even easier imo to be an atheist, who says they are gods worthy of worship, and not just power parasitic creatures wanting to dominate and leech from their worshippers?
Real world example, some religions worshipped the sun, while modern atheists would just think of the sun as just another star. Same thing seen in two completely different ways.
You'll enjoy the actual video then! About half way through I start discussing a planescape faction who believe something verrry similar
I think the problem with this line of reasoning is that you are comparing the standard D&D pantheon to the modern day conceptualization of a god, but what we now think of when we think of a god has been heavily influenced by our modern day monotheistic religions. If we want to compare like with like we have to look to other polytheistic religions, and if we compare the D&D pantheon to the Norse pantheon or the Greek pantheon it's pretty obvious to me that the D&D gods are in fact gods.
Sure you can make the argument that the gods are undeserving of worship, but within the standard D&D pantheon there are beings that definitely exist and those beings are defined as gods. By saying the gods aren't actually gods you are essentially using a different definition of god then the one that the vast majority of people in a standard D&D setting are using.
Hm, I once played a tiefling warlock that I called an athiest at the time, but after watching this video... she was more of a deist or anthitheist like the Athar, since she didn't deny the existence of the gods. She did, however, adamantly believe, and answer to her beliefs honestly when asked, that the gods were merely a higher level of power which anyone could achieve given enough time, luck, and effort - as evidenced by the several mortals who became gods themselves. She went through several charges of blasphemy, had to put up with rocks and rotten fruit thrown at her, and insults being hurled left and right at several points during the various campeigns she was a part of - until she essentially became the ruler of the area and put a stop to that through force like a less-powerful, but still epic, version of the lady of pain. Later on she even became a bit of a solipist, since her adamant belief was eventually okayed by the GM to allow her to spec into one of the divine hybrid prestige classes.
I must say, this was a delightful video. You tied planescape lore and philosophy beautifully!
It could simply be that they don't believe the gods are "Gods"
When we have things like demons, devils, Primordials, elementals... And we've seen mortals can become these "Gods" and these "Gods" can die.
They don't think the gods are all-powerful divine beings, just very powerful creatures with divine-like powers.
I imagine actually being smited by a god is rare unless you do something like trash their holy sites, deconvert a lot of worshippers, etc. Many gain resources from faith, and thus cannot spend it too liberally, and most don’t have time for every minor minutiae.
This endless debate generally assumes that we're playing D&D in the Forgotten Realms (or in this particular case, the wider setting of Planescape). This is not a reliable assumption. There exist plenty of D&D settings at various tables where gods do _not_ exist (as in mine) or their existence is not certain.
There's also a poor understanding of the role of faith here that I wouldn't expect from your background. The common person in a world where a god or gods are certain would certainly subscribe to religious beliefs. Farmers, who have a strong incentive both to integrate with a religious community and to call upon supernatural favor for their wellbeing, would probably be the most religious profession outside of the explicitly religious ones.
Well, yes, of course. But let's be honest, most games tend to use the gods from the handbook, as unfortunate as that may be.
Anyway, yes, that is the assumption of this video, as it's the default setting for a reason (and the default pantheon for more games than one might expect!)
@@Grungeon_Master Certainly. A custom cosmology is quite a task to take up, so it makes sense to run these reliable, popular pantheons, and in that context this video is a really good look into what rejection of the gods would mean for tabletop characters.
Re: your second point,
Yes, my 'ignorant farmer' example is certainly a flaw in the video. It's certainly true that folk religion is often at its strongest among small working communities. However, I think I was working under the assumption that folk deities would likely not count as Gods in a traditional sense (perhaps more like spirits of the land, or archfey, or magical creatures). This is how it is in my main campaign world, which does leave room for the 'ignorant farmer' trope.
However, in the forgotten realms tradition, I agree, a religiously ignorant farmer would be very hard to find indeed.
I absolutely loved this look into planescape. I think that there are several other things that can be looked at as well, like the school of necromancy or other things of the sort.
I think that a way to make the existence of gods vague, its to NEVER give them a hand or voice. Every time they cast a spell that seeks direct and inmediate help just denied it or subvert it with character specific symbologies and belief. Like, if they want water, it start raining from a small cloud, or a pipe breaks, or you notice that the enemy guard have a water bottle, or there is a fountain just over the corner. This way, they can still interpret a miracle while maintaining plausable deniability.
In the context of D&D, not believing in gods is like not thinking trees are real or that you don't have blood until you are dying. For atheism to work in D&D, it would need to be not that the gods exist, but if they are truly all-powerful and if they could be killed like any other being.
One could be an atheist in the sense that they see gods as merely another species of being. They might be more powerful and longer-living, but are fundamentally no more deserving of worship or respect than anyone else. Just as you might not voice such thoughts about the king within earshot of royalists for fear of reprisals, you might stay quiet about such thoughts about the gods wherever they or one of their representatives might be listening. Then again, if the gods can read your thoughts anyway, you might as well speak them aloud.
@@AndrianTimeswift no, that’s heresy not atheism
@@davidmc8478 The difference, I suppose, is merely a semantic one, but it would be to basically believe that the gods are not actually gods. It would be like saying that a Pharaoh was not a god. You're not doubting the existence of the Pharaoh, but you are doubting his claim of divinity.
It used to be in older dnd editions if you were an atheist you got stuck to a wall for eternity or eaten by asmodeus when you died
If you have a magical setting with demonstrable divine beings who intervene in mortal affairs, you CAN still have an atheist who is not an idiot.
They must acknowledge that there are beings who have abilities far beyond mortal reach, but they don't have to accept divinity as a concept. Their view of the world would be strictly naturalistic, and they would seek to find mundane answers to all of life's mysteries. Presented with a god, they wouldn't simply accept that being as a god and either submit to it or rage against it. They would try to study it, understand what it really is and what makes it tick, and try to replicate their findings. Or, if that's beyond their capability to do, they would simply admit that further study is beyond their capability, and that there remain open questions that need to be answered someday, and tentatively leave it at that.
Such a person could still be called an atheist, within the context of that setting. They would have no faith, and they would not be content with a mystery to remain a mystery. Theistic phenomena do not exist in their worldview, even if there are powerful beings that mortals have decided to call gods.
This is subtly different from the Athar and the Bleakers, though, as it keeps the door open to discovery and innovation. The core reason why any of it should be studied at all is simply that it's interesting, and that's an end in and of itself. But there's a practical side-effect. If you can probe the true laws of reality that underpin even the gods themselves, then you can begin to shape the world according to your own will in ways that might be seen as unnatural or artificial.
In the real world, major religious institutions sought to stifle the sciences, declaring them to be a blasphemous affront to God or an attempt to gain forbidden knowledge. Many great thinkers, from Francis Bacon to Galileo Galilei suffered severe punishment for their inquiries despite warnings from the Church to stop their activities. The very same could be true of D&D. The gods could be little more than the equivalent of modern billionaires throwing egotistical temper tantrums at the suggestion that tax loopholes be cinched shut, albeit with tremendous magical power at their disposal.
In certain settings, Atheism isn't the disbelief in the gods, but choosing not to worship them. Look at Ember from Wrath of The Righteous. She chooses not to worship gods, but she knows the exist, even has the backing of an Empyreal Lord, and says things like 'The gods can't help us, so we have to help each-other'.
In my stories, those that don’t believe in any god are reincarnated without any memories. But with an unnatural desire to worship a god. Gods derive their power from worship so what better way then to ensure someone will worship at least one of you.
I think the biggest point against the Bleakers are clerics. Why 'play the game' and farm when for some time in the temple I can make food for free? Why spend decades learning medicine when I can spend less time in dedication to a god and cast a simple spell? If the Bleakers think so highly of 'the rules' why dismiss all beings that break them?
The only kind of atheist character I can really think of that fits into D&D world settings isn't a disbeliever but a refuser, someone who feels at odds with the gods and ether
A: wishes to avoid all godly contact, chooses a life as removed as one can be from faith
B: someone who actively seeks to undermine the gods at any and every turn
to make it clear this isn't an Atheist in the sense we'd see one, however I think in a lot of D&D universes Atheist fits better as a "godless" character, someone who's views are at odds with the gods rather than someone who disbelieves.
Also what i thought off, in a D&D world an atheist might just be someone that recognizes that gods and there followers have powers, after all the priest just healed there broken leg last week
But that doesn't mean that the gods are worthy of worship, for some reason or another, there followers might regularly wage devasting wars against each other for example
Why woud take the "gods" word for truth? Is cause their might? Lots of powerful beings existe and they don't claim godhood or are the same type of being.
Is it cause they are empowered by worship? So I point towards the many non-divine beings that do similar things?
* Cough * Wall of the Faithless * Cough *
Honestly, Gods in DND are just more powerful than average guys. Especially when technically, you can become technically just as powerful as Gods if you wish to.
The beauty of DnD is you can make your own worlds. Worlds with magic and no gods, gods who withheld magic from the mortal world, or just pure science based space exploration world with neither. Or both. None of it is reality.
I like to think of it as - in D&D Gods are given power and influence by their followers, a D&D atheist might be someone who is choosing to forsake potentially having a God's favor because they don't want them to exist; or at least to not have any power. A D&D atheist that doesn't recognize them as real is an idiot, a D&D atheist that consciously chooses not to grant Gods power with their belief/praise likely has reasons for that belief - especially considering that they're forsaking any potential favor from them
They are, because all of the smart atheists, who don't believe in god, but will start to believe if there are concrete evidence, already started to believe.
A potential extension of Sign of One and/or Athar: Psionics are proof that the power of individual will can influence reality. By extension, enough people in consensus about what reality is could shape it, including in the form of empowering or even creating powerful entities that might call themselves gods.
The Athar's philosophy is akin to that of many pre-monotheistic religions. To many classical writers, gods were treated less as supreme beings and more as really powerful lords, just a step above kings and emperors and just as capable of being petty, capricious, or selfish. Worship was far more transactional, and most religious rites could be interpreted as attempts to flatter, appease, bargain with, or deceive one or more gods.
In my own D&D world, there is a small but persistent philosophical movement which advises having as little to do with the gods as possible. Their philosophy is often summed up as "If we ignore the gods, maybe they'll leave us alone."
I feel like the main thing that an atheist in DnD could rely on, from a philosophical point of view, is that there's no real evidence that gods exist as a category. From divine magic, clerics and the like, we can tell that there exist some extremely powerful beings which can provide power to individuals of their choice. Meanwhile, from the existence of 5th level wizards, we can tell that there exist some moderately powerful beings which can provide power to individuals of their choice- there's a difference of scale, but not necessarily a difference in category. That's not even considering the existence of warlocks, or bards being able to duplicate cleric spells without worshipping any particular god- I'd say based on the game mechanics there's more evidence that the category "god" has no particular merit, from a point of view of categorisation rather than applying morality to the gods
I would call most of the characters I play in D&D atheists. They do not deny that creatures with great power exist whom many treat as gods and who portray themselves as gods. Rather they deny that these creatures are anything more than powerful beings. These beings did not create the world do not continue to cause it to exist. They do not transcend the world. However powerful they may be, they are just beings within the world.
I studied ancient pre-Christian religions as part of history. To Graeco-Roman society, a deity was anything that influenced people's lives over which they had no power. In Greek, for example, any abstract noun was a minor deity. To an ancient Greek or Roman, to say gods don't exist would literally make no sense. So, to define atheism, one needs to define deities.
The Atheist equivalent would be thinking the gods are just powerful creatures.
It's called belief because it's not knowledge.
Not sure if anyone will care but its kinda related.
I'm currently playing in a Forgotten realms D&D campaign as a Dwarven forge cleric of Muradin, who is basically an Athar. he believes that the gods are just the biggest fishes in the cosmic sea, but are just as susceptible to foibles and failings as any man and thus not truly Divine , That said he has done good works in the world and is a great crafter and thus has earned Muradin's favor, as Muradin is known not to care about the why of acts but rather the outcomes. He has seen fit to give him some of his divine power. My Dwarf was very conflicted by this for a long time until he eventually started to think of it like a patron to an artisan in renaissance Italy (not a warlock patron). The patron has seen the works you have created and decided they want more, therefor they give you room and board and money and generally do things to free the artisan of distractions and impediments so that he can keep making the things that the patron liked. And if he stops making things the patron likes he can stop supporting him in his endeavors at any time. Except instead of lodging and food and art supplies, it's divine power and holy fire.
Within the Forgotten Realms settings, at least, the anti-religious position isn't so much atheism, the belief that the gods don't exist, but rather Faithlessness, the belief that gods as a whole are unworthy of worship, or should be defied rather than deified. It's fairly similar to the Athar from Planescape.
The average farmer in the Realms, for example, does have some religion, even just general prayer-vibes to an agriculture goddess like Chauntea that his crops will grow well. Or Chauntea might view his agriculture as indirect worship and claim him as an honorary follower. When he dies, his soul, like all mortals', goes to the Fugue Plane, where it waits to be collected by representatives of a god; Chauntea, in this example, might send an angel of some kind to gather him, and bring him to her plane to continue his afterlife.
If someone actively chooses to not worship any gods, or does something that causes all their gods to reject them, then when they die and their soul ends up in the fugue plane, no one comes to claim them. The God of the Dead, Kelemvor, judges them to be Faithless, and condemns them. Their soul is then fused into the wall encircling the Fugue Plane, where they spend eternity as just another brick in the wall of unclaimed souls, unless maybe a demon clawing at the wall manages to destroy you. It's a pretty miserable afterlife, all things considered, compared to the farmer existing blissfully in Elysium, but it might be better than eternal torture in the Hells.
Randomly stumbled across your video on adventuring guilds and then this one.
Fascinating work, honestly.
My world is one of my own construction, so it exists outside the classical D&D cannon. That said, this is how I'd run it if someone was an atheist: just for starters, they would have none of the benefits of being a believer and none of the protections. Healing spells would not work on them--the divine would withhold that for people who believe. Depending on the situation, they might suffer terrible penalties to saving throws against divine magic or have none at all as there is no god that is willing to intervene and provide a modicum of protection on the character's behalf. gods take a typically dim view of mortals who deny their existence.
My take on planescape was that it was an interesting thought experiment, but it drains something I find essential in a fantasy based TTRPGs--for me it's creating a world where the Iliad and Odyssey might take place, where heroes like Beowulf and Gilgamesh might walk the earth. Where you can go on adventures like Jason and his Argonauts or Sinbad--and fusing this with real history like Henry V at Agincourt, or the battles of Towton, Crecy, Barnet---where good is defined by that which supports the divine order and one's home community, and evil is defined by that which threatens or seeks to undermine the divine order and threatens one's home community. For instance--Thirteenth Warrior is as close to perfect a D&D movie as one can get.
I think atheism in dnd isn't saying that the results or entities resulting from what the common populous call "gods". It's saying that the entities called "gods" are just people that have alot of individual power. They're not all powerful, they can be killed. I feel like a wizard would be more drawn to atheism in this idea because they'd understand how magic works very intricately, and would understand how some of the principles behind "divine" magic and other "miracles" work.
In a fantasy realm, some see the gods as beings to worship, while others see godhood as an achievable goal.
I just fundamentally reject the idea that magic or miracles are evidence of gods. Jesus could do everything it says he did in the Bible and it would not say anything about his claims of being the son of god or of god's existence. Okay, you have the power to walk on water. That's evidence of supernatural abilities at best. It's the same with magic in dnd. If you can't show me the direct arcane string that connects my fireball to god, i have no reason to believe.
I have a divinity system where the majority of gods only exist (let alone are powerful) because people believed in superstition. Their existence and power literally rely on people worshipping or fearing them.
There are gods that exist beyond belief, but are granted more power through belief. All through some kind of accidental coven cast Wish spell
I had an idea for a scientifically-minded atheist DnD character who insists that people who get their power from supposed deities are simply engaged in a symbotic relationship with a more powerful creature.
Once again, i thank you kindly for talking about what you have.
Now that I've had a look at what you seems to have recently been covering, i may be a less than regular visitor, but i will gladly stop by for these more philosophical videos.
Thank you, and I wish you well!
ironically, the radical viewpoint you mentioned from the sign of one, the one where they deny the truth of anything that is not them, is exactly what is going on in a DM's mind when they are interacting with the npc's of their world, and to take that one step further, the athar or what else you mentioned before where an individual could think that everything around them is an elaborate trick designed by an entity above or more powerful than any other being in that world, is actually describing their world as a ttrpg and the role the DM plays in that rather sinsinktly
I am not sure atheist take on as big a risk as the video assumes. I haven't exactly heard of Lolth punishing humans for not believing in her, even though it would make sense a lot of them haven't even heard of her.
Most people in the world of DnD worship only a small subset of the gods, probably less than 5% if you want to count all the pantheons and regional dieties. But they don't seem to be punished for it.
I think for the most part Gods just wouldn't care specifically about them.
Clerics are also very poor evidence for dieties, all they are really evidence for is that there is a seperate kind of magic from the arcane. In fact the books call out that paladins can get their power from devotion to an ideal, not necisarily a divine entity. The mere act of believing something very hard, has power.
High level clerics can commune with their deities, and get actual useful information, but they are so rare that they can be explained away. It's not like wizards can't see the future with divination magic, the clerics just happen to convince themselves that their insights come from a higher power.
"Roving gangs of philosophers" sounds rather Pythonesque.
Me as a DnD character: I’m not necessarily an atheist, I just don’t think that they’re any more special than we are in the grand scheme of things. The gods are too busy in their own way and I am busy in mine.
Other character: I suppose that is one way to look at things but what about their miracles and rewards for your actions towards them?
Me: Okay now think about this. If you have a bunch of people following you around asking you for things and rewards are you going to get anything done? No, not really but if you ask them to take care of some of the tasks you have then it might get done albeit poorly. Though, it may alleviate some stress for a little while you’re not really doing your job at its best when you’re the ultimate professional at such things and they are supposed to run the universe after all.
Other Character: That would be terrible but hey wouldn’t they be omnipotent beings who could handle all these tasks at once?
Me: That might be true but even gods have their limits however well they might hide them. Imagine if you took away the burden and they had more power to handle what they are supposed to be doing. Demons wouldn’t have a chance to get a foot hold in any realm. We would have less monstrosities and chaos and curses. They could do it all and better than before because their children are not hounding them for everything. Also aren’t some of the gods originally supposed to be mortal in their origin. So the omnipotent thing kind of doesn’t really make sense in this regard.
Other Character starts contemplating their own existence and going into crisis mode.
Me: Oh and I also forgot about the other tasks of the highest gods are to find ways to fend off the absolute abyss to keep existence itself intact. Without them pure Oblivion would be what you would see devouring everything and then the universe would just cease to exist with everything it contains.
Other Character starts rocking back and forth in a corner: I…I am not sure what to think anymore….but I know one thing. You freak me out.
Level 20 Wizards also exist and they cast wish or Banshee's Wail
TLDR: You can be an atheist in D&D, it's just not a very good or safe idea.
Just because gods exist doesn't mean we should start _believing_ in them. That would only encourage them.
I would argue that an "atheist" in D&D would be someone who doesn't deny the existence of the gods, per say, but rather denies these beings are actually gods.
It is a fact in D&D lore that many of the gods used to be mortals that simply gained enough power to ascend to godhood, while other beings worshipped as gods are actually just powerful outsiders like Archfey, Demon Lords, and Elemental Princes.
An "atheist" in D&D could simply assume that ALL beings others consider to be gods are of the same sort; just powerful magic-users who have duped others into worshipping them.
The Netherese believed that the gods were just supremely powerful mages.
i like the idea of people debating what the “gods” actually are, given how many different perspectives on divinity there are irl. i can imagine ideas like the hindu concept of the brahmin developing to explain where the gods come from, or something like buddhism where the existence of gods isn’t necessarily denied so much as they’re not really the main focus. maybe some of the gods don’t even really care exactly what terms mortals use to refer to them as long as they’re still getting the proper respect (to counterbalance the ones going around smiting nonbelievers)
I had a wizard who didnt believe the gods were divine but an ability of the masses to focus their will and manipulate the weave. I could be healed without spending time in a pew singing hymnals.
There is actual priests in dnd, then again there are also wizards, aliens, flying spheres with eyeballs, and more.
An atheist because you don't want to give any of them your worship. Or you you just see God's as people who got really strong
The gods are pretty essential to the cannon/lore of D&D they literally were walking the planet at one time to be taught a lesson. Atheism would be a very hard stance to take in such a setting as atheist always demand proof of a God and summoning an angel healing someone by laying hands or resurrecting a dead person or curing someone's blindness by invoking the name of a God would be pretty hard to refute. I think it was handled pretty well in Pathfinder:Kingmaker where it wasn't the rejection of the existence of Gods but someone who wanted to make their own path by their hands to live and die by their own merit and skill more of an argument against fate as the character was born with a destiny and purpose she is taught some hard lessons though.
Actually I think a committed atheist could deny the "proof" of a cleric's healing magic by saying that although the cleric claims his power comes from the gods, really he's just another spellcaster harnessing a particular kind magic. I'm not sure how well the average person understands the metaphysical distinction between the magic of a cleric, a sorcerer, and a druid besides the aesthetic.
@@Ruspanic Sorcerers and mages cannot grant others spells, their spells cannot be revoked like that of a cleric this would be the main distinctions. People generally don't deny Gods in D&D not even a farmer they know they exist a person who denies the Gods in D&D would be seen as delusional and probably be seen as a pariah and as dangerous cause they would be taught a lesson personally by the Gods and no one would want to be around that person. Would be like a person in this world mocking God only to be struck by lightning or some other force of nature, the good Gods probably won't do this but mock the evil Gods misfortune will befall you.
@@Ruspanic As a firm adherent to Clarke's Maxim and its corollary, I don't actually think there's a meaningful distinction between the magic of a cleric, a sorcerer, a druid, or a deity.
It bears mentioning what we even mean by "atheist" in a typical D&D cosmology. Most people in real life would probably consider "atheism" to refer to whether or not one believes deities exist, but in a D&D cosmology it may make more sense to define an "atheist" as one who doesn't *worship* one or more deities. Even pagans usually give most of their effort to worshipping only a subset of the full pantheon that they believe exists, so an "atheist" in that context might be someone who knows the gods exist but doesn't prostrate themselves before them.
There's a book called The Devil's Apocrypha, in which God and the angels are extra-planar entities who escaped their collapsing universe to ours, using their more advanced physiology to dominate the less evolved inhabitants.
As outsiders, however, they require an anchor to tether them to this plane. To do this, they used their powers to subjugate humans and force them to worship them, granting them power.
Lucifer and his angels weren't down with this, so they were exiled.
As an IRL atheist, I cannot fathom that atheism could reasonably exist in the same form in most DND settings, at least in the ones with active gods. The most reasonable form I can see for a “DND atheist” would be akin to “Batman atheism” where “I’ve met gods and I believe in their existence, I just don’t see any of them as being worthy of worship”.
What's a man to a king?
What's a king to a god?
What's a god to a nonbeliever who don't in... anything?
Atheist adventurers know deities exist, but see them as yet another high level monster.
It's similar to the Captain America take on Thor - he knows Thor exists, and has no ill will towards him at all, but doesn't think he's a deity or worthy of worship.
they know gods are real
they just don't believe they are worthy of worship
Funnily enough I have a Artificer who isn't an atheist, but a Misotheist. So his whole aim is to destroy the higher beings.
Amazing how all these factions fit in my largest setting due to two basic truths I set very early on, its the same reason why psions exist and are the only pure magic caster. The truths are: The Ether (The Weave) exists and is a fundamental constant, its the manipulation of the Ether or materials that naturally contain Ether that creates magical effects, and: People have Ether (The Aura or Soul) and can manipulate the sorrounding Ether mentally.
When people believe in a god's power they are "lending" them their faith, concentrating the psychic power of thousands of people into a single individual subconsciously. The more people believe in gods and the harder they believe in them, the more powerful the god, but if people suddenly change their beliefs, the god has to change with them. In this way, people can create gods like the kuo-toa. The larger the pantheon the weaker the god as they have to divide the faith of their followers among them. Primordials are no exception, they can be created from the subconsious of people thinking of fire or water as base elements when they are in fact a chemical process and a group of molecules and not comparable in any real sense.
Psions are the only pure caster because they are the only ones able to visualize this truth. Even if they explain to other people how this psionic aptitude works, people can only become psions if they have this eureka or epiphany by themselves. Its sort of like understanding vs comprehending. Other casters use crutches to cast magic, Artificers, Bards, and Wizards use tools, instruments, or focus, components, books, and formulaes, to channel the Ether to create magic. Clerics and Warlocks are lent their abilities by entities, Druids and Ranges are lent theirs by the plane. Paladins that gain their power through an Oath are the closest to a psion, but they can still loose their power by breaking the Oath as they loose faith in their Oath and themselves.
I also use this to explain all near-magical powers, like monks who can walk on water and use ki or barbarians who resist a blades edge with their very skin or even fighters suddenly healing with second wind or doubling their actions action surge.
Thank you for showing me these factions, they fit into the setting very well. Most people will continue to believe in the gods as they obviously have an effect on the world, but an order of psions who want to free themselves of the influence of the gods is a perfect fit for Sign of One.
"So as someone..." Is the cringiest, worst way to talk. Vomit inducing
I have another dnd way to deny god: a wizard did it, or more specifically, a wizard conspiracy, holy magic is just another spell school.
YASSSS! PLANESCAPE!!!! My fav setting. I DO hope they don’t BUTCHER it on the remake…but I won’t be holding my breath on that!
In my setting there is no proff of gods existing. Gods have never directly intervened in mortal affairs, and a clerics magic can come from believing in anything strongly enough, not just the gods. This puts wizards and clerics constantly at odds, since clerics tend to believe that only those who god chooses should have magic, while wizards believe that magic should be free for anyone to learn.
As a Jew, imo Judaism in a D&D world would present as a kind of atheism. As could some premodern Christianity.
As an anti-religious person, I still enjoy engaging with gods and faith in D&D and will happily play a deeply religious character.
I'm also open to killing gods with the power of friendship, heresy, questioning of religions in the world, and even player characters becoming gods, because why have gods as part of your world if they're just set dressing when they can be a fun part of the narrative?
Sure, the gods in the setting I use are distant and don't just send avatars to the Matarial Plane, but a player with access to the gods plane of residence can certainly go meet the god and challenge them if they wish and spells can be used to contact them. You can also meet and interact with their creations in the world.
Just because IRL religion creeps me out like some people hate snakes or spiders doesn't mean I can enjoy them in D&D. I just don't have any special reverence for them, they are "just" powerful entities people worship and not all things calling themselves gods are actual plane ruling deites with power over aspects of the world and reality.
You can bring IRL beliefs into the game, but you don't need to be hostile about it to your fellow players.
Nothing wrong with playing a militant anarco-socialist halfling rogue looking to break the systems of oppression, or the heretic human cleric who insists the god of nature and the god of death are just aspects of one god, *so long as you're all having fun with the game.* 😁
„The Gods did not reveal, from the beginning, all things to us, but in the course of time through seeking we may learn & know things better. But as for certain truth no man knows it, nor shall he know it, neither of the Gods nor yet of all things that I speak. For even if by chance he were to utter The Final Truth, he would himself not know it: for all is but a woven web of guesses.“ - Xenophanes
The way people and cultures understand divinity would definitively play a part here. Imagine, how would a monoteist react to the existence of many gods: "I, the prist of the Dreaming God deny the authority of your fake Idols, for only the One creator of all beings is worthy of reverance!" for example, against another posture like farmers worshiping the gods of rain and earth becouse it afects their day to day life in a way that a creator of all beings high in its cosmic throne does not. Is your way to define divinity an universal primordial force, perfect, omnipotent and omniscient that shapes, moves and ordains all things in existance from beyond existance itself, or are the manifestations of natural fonomena, given personhood, in which case, of course they are limited and imperfect but their power itself is enough to make them worth reverance, for them are the world given though and will? This is actually fascinating, not only for the way one would interact with organized religion, but with the gods themselves. Would you fight in a war in honor of the blood gods if you knew that beyond the sky there are hundred of thousands of stars just like ours with it's own planets, their own civilizations, their own gods, all of them as insigificant in the great cosmic see as yours? Would you deny worship to a minor god of the river for fear of infurating a pantocrator that probably doesn't even care about your miningless existance, or would you rater not infurate that minor river god that totaly could destroy your entire village without even caring if the pantocrator gives a shit or not?
D&D deities might be powerful, but so are dragons. The only consideration is not to get being killed by such tyrannical entities, but that doesn't mean that one has to worship them. Hell, most games even have this very wrong understanding of polytheism where people seem to choose a patron god and thus be atheistic towards all the other deities. This that is a obviously an option, so should be not having a a patron deity be very possible. And well, the clerics seem to be no different from warlocks, with them usually being the only source of the divine people encounter, it is easy to see how people could look at the clergy just as another type of caster. And well, settings like Athas (Dark Sun) also show that there are entire planets that have no deities, making it even more obvious that at least apatheism should be rather common. Otherwise one would also have to treat basically every warlock patron like a deity and all the ancient dragons as well, and probably many more powerful creatures, to such a degree that the term deity becomes basically meaningless and thus religion or atheism not even a debate, since it doesn't matter.
And as an aside, no solipsism does not necessarily have to lead to depression. Sure, meaning is a huge factor, but just because one does not find meaning outside oneself does not mean one can create meaning within and thus even without anything outside being of relevance one still could be solipsistic without succumbing to depression.
One of my characters is an "Athiest" he doesn't deny the existence of gods but he denies ther divinity and actually cindeof seeks to destroy them and replace them with somthing els that wuld leve mortals to them self
I understand atheism in DnD since to me, even if the Gods control the world on a larger scale, doesn't mean they're doing anything "for me"... why worship something that doesn't benefit yourself?
I love this video! Who better to question this philosophical idea as it pertains to D&D than our own the Grungeon Master. He hi-lights Sigil for good reason, but also Dark Suns would work too… he also points out three radicals (Athar, Bleak Cabal, the Sign of One)
Honestly, the Athar would get smited quickly to stop the spread of this blasphemy without remorse in most settings, though your DM might give you plot armor. This might be because of reasons (their own beliefs, to not smite you for yours, to let you get yourself killed in the game) but honestly it is just plot armor.
The Bleak Cabal who seek to live without religion or philosophy may just be shunned by the D&D world or laughed out of town. This is more than just denialism of the realities of the D&D world but to deny philosophy? Which is how we point to what is good and evil in society, defines how we make and develop as a society, and so so so much more. When I say laughed out of town I mean this would be a dysfunctional member or members in a city, the guy/gal no one trusts such as in conspiracy theorist, they could maybe own there own business, but likely is dysfunctional when having to socialize, they might just decide to move out of the city to live on a farm or in the mountains and trees, but away from Druids and could maybe make an interesting Ranger with a reason to stay out of cities due to there beliefs and social issues. Someone who lives in society with this belief, hopefully has a family member help them navigate through life.
The Sign of One rather comes straight out of some classic philosophical ideas of extreme interpretations of personal experience, I hope they never experience any kind of charm spell where they are manipulated by a being external to them or worse one they can not directly see because this could be world shattering to them. These people are truly need safe spaces because it is not the gods who will get to them first, it will be a random mundane magic user who wants to troll them, or prove a point about how they indeed have even less control over what could happen to them outside of there peripheries than we do in our own Real World.
To answer the Grungeon Masters question, even in the extremity of Sigil which recognizes the forces they must keep out, this belief and behavior is not only, to quote, “idiotic” but encourages personal risk and could become even deadly to the person… it might be able to exist on the fringe of societies and would be notable more likely in Dark Suns.
I agree with these ideas, but also i've seen another one in one of my sessions. In it some people in small village don't believe in god's, because there's no clerics (with magical powers) in this village. These people think, that gods leave them, so there no reasons to prey or do something like that.